


Frontier Psychiatrist

by maryaliceoptics



Category: The OC (TV)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-12 03:22:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29503350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maryaliceoptics/pseuds/maryaliceoptics
Summary: Ryan Atwood had a difficult start. Even though he loved his family, he basically parented himself. Ryan was fatherless, his mother struggled with addiction, and his brother in jail. Even when he lived with the Cohen's, he never truly felt like he had parents.In this story, Ryan works on healing himself, his family, and reaches a place of acceptance, motivation, and drive to support others who need it.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 2





	Frontier Psychiatrist

**Author's Note:**

> This is my very first Fanfic! I'll be adding to it whenever I have motivation. Any feedback would be much appreciated. Thanks so much!

Chapter One

Ryan kicked his shoes off and collapsed on his bed. He closed his eyes and let his attention focus on his breath; fascinated by one of the only things that humans can control. Before long, his attention shifted to a place of reflection. He thought about how hard AP physics was at Harbor, but had nothing on the advanced psychology classes he was taking at UCLA. Ryan needed an elective during his first year of university, so he jokingly signed up for Intro to Psych. He had a fucked childhood and was never presented the opportunity to go to therapy. When he lived with the Cohen’s, Sandy always encouraged Ryan and Seth to talk whenever they needed to, but something always held Ryan back. Ryan knew Sandy wouldn’t really understand. Sandy was compassionate and hell, if it wasn’t for Sandy, Ryan may have been in jail, or worse, dead. Though Sandy and Kirsten had an open door policy when it came to friends in need and often encouraged the boys to open up, Ryan just couldn’t. So, he registered for Intro to Psych and knew by the end of class, he was meant to be a counsellor. The next day he changed his major from Architecture and Urban Design to Counselling Psychology and he never looked back. Now at the end of his Bachelors, he was really pushing himself so he could get accepted in UCLA’s highly competitive Masters program. 

Ryan had his fair share of shitty social workers that came in and out of his life. He never bothered to remember their names because he knew they wouldn’t be around for long. They always entered the relationship with preconceived notions of what sort of person Ryan was. And that was Ryan’s biggest grievances: not being truly seen. He remembered sitting in offices that looked the same. Grey-cream walls with slightly-crooked generic art that had cheesy motivational slogans like: “If you can dream it, you can do it.” – Walt Disney and “Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.”– Theodore Roosevelt. The chairs had split leather from holding all of the asses of other kids just like him. Or, rather, similar to him. Kids that had stories of poverty, addiction, guns, mental health, intergenerational trauma. Ryan didn’t have the knowledge or the framework at the time to know that everyone does in fact have a different story. The plot of a person’s life story could start out awfully similar but there is a danger to approaching people as monolith entities. It wasn’t until Ryan started his psychology and sociology classes that he learned of honouring a person’s complexities. His favourite TedTalk that he has watched about 10 times since first watching it in his Psychology, Gender, and Race course, is The Danger of a Single Story by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. He hopes to show that TedTalk to every kid that enters the door of his future practice. He wants to let them know that there is magic to being the only them in this world. That their story has a place and that they also need to listen to other’s stories. He also knows that his story is one that not everyone would suddenly be invited into a mansion to live with a rich family.

Ryan knew how lucky he was that he had a surfer hippy community-oriented lawyer instead of someone working for a paycheque. He shifted his thoughts to his journal. Ryan started taking journaling seriously when he decided he was going to heal. It’s a big decision: to heal. Not only was Ryan healing for himself, but he was healing for his family. His journal was full of letters to his mom. Letters that he would never share with her and wouldn’t ever leave the confines of the confidential Therapist-Client relationship. They felt good to write. Though Ryan verbally forgave his mom for abandoning him, twice, he didn’t know if he ever fully did. He thought about how hard it was to open the door of his home in Chino and be met with the vastness of empty. He also thought of how difficult it must have been for his mom to make the decision to have Ryan stay with the Cohen’s. He got it, or at least he tried to, but he did wish his mom made more of an effort other than the occasional Christmas gift to build a relationship. Growing up, when Ryan was out of food at his house, he would ask a nearby restaurant if he could have any mistake-orders. The owners of Guasti Homestyle Cafe showed up in Ryan’s life in more ways than Ryan could ever fully grasp. Not only did they feed him, they allowed him to open a tab and have it remain open. If it wasn’t for their chorizo and egg breakfasts that he consumed anytime of the day, he wouldn’t have had the energy and stamina to play soccer with. Guasti even covered the cost for Ryan to play after-school soccer from ages 11 up until he left Chino. He was getting really good and even made it to the Pomona Premier Youth Soccer League. Ryan was incredibly grateful to the Guasti family and was very recently able to close his tab and open up a new tab: a tab that he puts part of his scholarship money to that covers the cost of meals for other kids who are hungry. 

Ryan closed his journal and stuck it in one of the wicker baskets he brought over from his old pool house. It was the only bit of that place he asked to keep. In his own studio apartment close to campus, he felt good finally having a place of his own. Ryan noticed his thoughts starting to shift to guilt. Was it bad to be disappointed in the Cohen’s a little bit? The entire time Ryan lived with them, not once did they ask if he wanted to decorate the pool house to his taste. They had no problem tearing the walls down of their kitchen and living room to remodel when Seth ran away to Portland for a period of time, yet making the pool house less beige was not high on their list of priorities. Ryan never had a space that felt truly his own. Growing up, he shared a room with his brother and then eventually just slept on the couch because his mom often had friends over and needed his room for them. And then with the Cohen’s, it was their pool house, their decor, their decisions. That’s why the first question Ryan asked before signing his lease was: can I paint? Ryan’s favourite colour is forest green. He liked it because of the sheer lack of green that California has. He often thought about how much he enjoyed Portland’s greenery and one day he hopes to drive up the coast and visit Vancouver, BC one day just to immerse himself in green.


End file.
